


Just Two Days

by galacticMouse_Mouse_413



Series: AW Works [1]
Category: None - Fandom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-25
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2019-03-23 18:34:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13793688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/galacticMouse_Mouse_413/pseuds/galacticMouse_Mouse_413
Summary: If you were to ask Neah, how her first week went, she'd smile. She'd smile and she'd never answer you. She doesn't like to remember her first week, and it's better to assume she does not.She doesn't want to remember her first week. And she doesn't, really. She just remember two days with startling clarity.Just two days.





	Just Two Days

You tug the two canines forward, hands resting at the napes of their necks-- unassuming, but you’d taken them both down without a weapon, with only the reach of your sigilmancy and the brute strength of your blows. They knew to bend to your will. When the superior appraises them with a critical eye, the animator-- a labrador retriever-- stares back defiantly. He is completely different from the delicate Shih Tzu that trembles beneath your palm and keeps her head bowed low. You glance at him from the corner of your eyes-- an attitude like that will shorten his lifespan here-- and when it does, when the blade slides home, you close your eyes and release him allowing his full weight to fall onto it. You hardly shift when his form crumbles to a heap right next to your feet. You barely give the Shih Tzu a glance as she is pulled away from your grasp-- one that you knew was safer than what awaited her now.   


You steady yourself and hold the superiors gaze, as they eye you critically-- the francs in your pocket burn _burn_ burns in its place, but you don’t let your fingers twitch, don’t let yourself be cowed. You hold their gaze, and as you do you remember the child’s shaking hands-- _a labrador retriever pup_ \-- remember her small trembling voice thanking you, remember the small sliver of a smile you’d given her, remember the feeling of knowing a little light didn’t flicker out of existence because of you, and you feel your resolve harden and you hold the superior in the same harrowing grip as they did you. When you are dismissed, a soldier passes the rabbit you told them to hold right back into your arms, and you cradle them like they’re something precious.

Later, in your house, you kiss the rabbit, newly dubbed Butterknuckles, between the ears and head outside. You wander along familiar routes until you spot a familiar blond head of hair and pounce the lion until he beats the agitation out of your veins. You watch other cats come and go and spar-- you leap at the five-star and feel pride well in your chest when you land a really good hit on him before getting knocked unconscious. When you rise moments later, there is blood in your teeth and no fight left in you, and you grin at the sky from your eagle-spread position in the dirt. Hunter pulls you to your feet and tells you to go home-- you spit blood into the dirt and tell him to take his own advice, he looks ready to wither away into dust, and you limp away with laughter on your tongue and his indignant yowling in your ears.

* * *

 

The next day is uneventful-- you have helped a soldier in one breath and stolen from one in another. You grumble at the rate you’ve been sneezing lately-- was there something in the air? You were sure it wasn’t allergy season quite yet. You perch carefully in treetops and watch, waiting for something, or nothing. Nothing is better-- the less you have contact with the higher ups, the better in your opinion-- and then you see her.

A small husky, with a blinding white pelt. Did she think she wouldn’t be seen, with her fur white as snow? She sticks out like a sore thumb. _She’s lucky I found her first,_ you think as you leap and land in front of her and scare the daylights out of her. You draw yourself to your full height-- an unimpressive 5’3 really-- but she cowers nonetheless and begs for her life to be spared, stumbling back and falling and curling into a fearful little ball. You crouch low, and extend a hand-- she squeezes her eyes shut, fearing a blow, but receives a gentle pet between the ears instead. “You should go home.” You say, and smile as her incredibly blue eyes widen with hope and she grins wide and thanks you profusely. When she shoves francs into your palms, you take it, but only because you are broke, and even with the internal justification you still feel like a scumbag for accepting the money.

The little pup, with big hopeful eyes looks back once more, and smiles gratefully-- you give her a smirk in return and plan to watch her run all the way to the wall and back to safety. But you suddenly feel the change in wind pressure, see the streak of black and feel your throat warm with a warning that came too late, that would never leave your lips-- and you watch her crumble and gag on her own blood. Her eyes are big and devoid of hope and betrayed, as the life drains from them, and you force yourself to school your expression into something carefully blank. The superior looms over you, though he is several feet away. When he speaks, you feel a smile slide all too easily across your lips-- “You're welcome, sir.” You reply, and turn away from him as he does you, turn away from the limp body in his hands, but you cannot stop seeing red _red_ blood and blue _blue_ blue eyes.

You do not bother Alistair that night-- in fact you don’t bother anyone. You stay home, curled in your bed sheets with what you think might be dried tear tracks on your cheeks but you aren’t quite sure, you just haven’t stopped thinking of those big blue eyes full of hope, full of light, full of death, and how pretty her blood looked, how crudely it would dry across the grass. You think of how next time you’d bring a child-- bring them into the maw of death, into the gaping jaws of a beast, and then you feel anger flush your system at such a thought. You are _not_ a coward. You will _not_ be cowed. If they choose to kill children fine-- _fine_. They can do that. But _you_ are _not_ in the business of killing them or deliberately sending them to their deaths, and you _never will be_. Perhaps, they will have to live with that-- perhaps you will have to die with it.  


Except you don’t plan on dying anytime soon.

You’ll just have to wait and see.


End file.
